Population growth is the change in population totals. It can be negative or positive.

Positive change is when it increases and negative change is when it decreases. Population increases when there are more immigrations and births than deaths. Population decreases when there are more emigrations and deaths than births.

When there is a balance between the births and deaths, population is said to be stable.

Kenya's population growth

Looking at Kenya's past and predicted population growth we can see that;

1. Population in Kenya has grown steadily since 1950.

2. Population in Kenya is predicted to continue rising steadily in the future.

Effects of rapid population growth

High population growth leads to the following problems:

• Land is subdivided amongst many family members and becomes too small to support individual family units.
• Many people migrate from rural areas to look for jobs in urban areas.
• When people are too many in a country the government needs more food in order to feed them.
• If food is not available many people starve to death unless other countries step in to help.

• Too many people living in one place destroy the environment.
• In crowded areas, people destroy forests and use them as wood fuel.
• They also cultivate forest land over and over making the soil exhausted for production.

• Increase in demand for food cannot be met because there are few able-bodied people in rural areas.

This causes shortage of labour on farms.

Effects of low population growth rate

The following are the good and bad effects of low population growth:

• Resources in the country are enough for the people present.
• Everybody has a job and hence can provide for his or her needs.
• The country has to depend on workers from other countries who invest back to their countries. Some sectors of the country like security cannot depend on foreign or migrant workers.
• There is an increase in ageing population causing the country to have large number of people needing special care, which costs the country extra money.
• Today, some countries have to pay younger couples to have babies so that they can run the country’s economy in future.
• Available facilities in the countries are not fully utilised. Therefore, they become wasted.

Ways of managing rapid population growth

• People should be educated on the effects of a fast growing population.
• They should be helped to understand the relationship between population and resources like land, water and forests.
• Use of family planning methods should be encouraged in order to reduce family sizes.
• Parents should be made to understand that whether they have daughters or sons, they should value them equally.
• They should be helped to change their cultural values.
• With improved health, few people will die therefore, there will be no need to have increased population.
• Early marriages should be discouraged.

Ways of managing slow population growth

• Young couples should be encouraged to have children.
• Some countries pay young couples to have babies.
• Countries with low population growth should encourage people to migrate into their countries.

Effect of HIV and AIDS on population growth

• Many people die; leading to a negative population growth.
• Use of protective contraceptives like condoms lead to slow population growth.
• Abstinence for fears of contraction of sexually transmitted diseases leads to slow population growth.
• Death of parents lead to an increase of orphans resulting to high dependancy ratio.